


Don’t Forgive Me

by StarFusion617



Category: Among Us (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Among Us AU, Blood, Futuristic VR, George is colorblind, Gore, M/M, VR Headsets, Virtual Reality, loss of awareness of the outside world, simulated pain
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-19 02:02:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29618895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarFusion617/pseuds/StarFusion617
Summary: When Dream buys himself and George a new, ultra-realistic virtual reality headset designed to immerse the user completely into a game, George thinks nothing of it.Well, he’s maybe a little mad at Dream because these things areexpensive!Then he learns that some of their friends have them too, and he can’t just not use it...But when they load up a game of Among Us with a few of their friends, they quickly realize that this is no game.It’s a real-life murder mystery.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF), Zak | Skeppy/Darryl | BadBoyHalo (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 22





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I know this isn’t super original, but I really wanted to do it with an aspect of the outside world still intact, instead of just making the Among Us game its own universe.

“George!”

Dream’s voice came through his headset loud and excited, and George couldn’t stop the smile spreading on his face at the familiarity of it.

“So you _do_ have something to do with the mysterious box that showed up on my doorstep this morning,” George responded teasingly, suppressing a laugh at the awkward moment of silence that followed.

“Um...yes. But please don’t be mad! I got one too, so we can play together. I have to spend my money on _something_...”

The last part was mumbled under Dream’s breath, but George caught it and chuckled.

“Alright, alright. Just as long as it wasn’t _too_ expensive,” he warned.

Dream’s silence said everything George needed to know about the price of the package.

“Dream!”

“I know! I know, but just...please open it?”

George sighed and shook his head, even though his friend couldn’t see it.

“Okay, fine. I’ll go get something sharp to open it with. Be right back,” he answered grudgingly.

He was back within a minute, using the small knife to slice open the layers of packaging tape holding the giant box together. Inside were multiple smaller boxes, along with one slightly larger one that looked to be the main product.

Carefully cutting open each smaller box first, which contained everything from batteries to power chargers, George finally opened the biggest one last.

“Dream...is this what I think it is?”

Dream had been uncharacteristically silent while George had been opening the boxes, but now he spoke up again.

“Probably. It’s the newest VR headset.”

“...The one that renders the user unconscious and transports their mind into a completely computerized world, with never-seen-before technology?” George asked cautiously.

“Yup, that’s the one!” Dream responded, his voice extremely carefree considering how expensive these things were.

George just sighed again, knowing he wasn’t going to win this one.

Instead, he ripped the protective packaging away from the headset and found the manual, realizing that as complicated as the technology must be, the designers had certainly made it user-friendly.

All he had to do was connect the headset to a wall outlet with a cord from one of the smaller boxes, plug it into a charging cord from another, and power it on.

The other boxes had extra cords, portable chargers, cleaners, and converters in case the user didn’t have the same outlets as the cords needed.

Dream’s voice chimed back in as George switched the headset on.

“Mine is already set up, and some of our friends have them, too. We can play as soon as we get them all together.”

George, aside from being a little shocked at his friend’s obvious pre-planning, was instantly excited and agreed without any hesitation.

Dream’s cheeky, “Well I didn’t expect you to say no,” gave him the idea that his friend secretly knew how excited he was, regardless of how mad he was at Dream for buying him the entire thing without letting him know.

———

Around two hours later, Dream messaged George, saying that Sapnap, Bad, Skeppy, Fundy, Wilbur, Quackity, Karl, and Technoblade were down to play Among Us with them.

George responded asking if they should voice chat, to which Dream reasoned that it shouldn’t be necessary, since the developers had made the headsets have online chatting systems to use in-game.

So George scanned the manual one last time before plugging the headset into his computer, where he had Among Us ready to launch on his desktop screen.

The manual had said to launch the game after putting the headset on, so George flipped the visor away from the headpiece and slid the cool plastic around his head. Once he flipped the visor back into place, the headset was shaped like a headband, with the front covering his eyes and the rest connecting over his ears and around the back of his head in a circle.

With the visor on, George’s world became his desktop screen, with all his app icons spread out in front of him. Experimentally, he reached out to touch the one for Among Us.

To his surprise, his hand appeared in his field of vision, and it looked like he actually touched the app icon when it lit up as it activated.

George watched wonderingly as the game opened and his vision was filled with the star-speckled home screen.

The familiar labeled buttons appeared in front of him, but there was an extra one named “Connect.”

Curious, George reached a hand forward and touched it, causing the button to glow and the screen to shift.

The new screen was a list of names with a search bar at the top. The username bar was still present, so George tapped it, and a keyboard appeared beneath it. He typed in his username and hit enter, and the list of names disappeared along with the keys.

Now only one remained: Dream.

Figuring Dream must have done something to make his name show up for his friends, George touched the glowing letters.

Immediately, his screen went dark, and a robotic voice flared to life inside the headset.

“Extending mic...checking sound systems...downloading data...checking compatibility...securing connection...”

After the last phrase, George felt a gentle puff of air against his ears and a strange tingling feeling in his head. The feeling slowly spread until he couldn’t feel his body anymore, and then his world fell into darkness.

———

When George awoke, he was sitting, strapped into a chair. As he unbuckled the straps and pulled them over his head, a voice sounded from in front of him.

“Hey, George! You made it!”

George looked up as he stood and saw Dream standing a few feet away. His friend was wearing a lime green jumpsuit with a matching space helmet tucked under one arm. A flat white mask with a black smiley face was perched sideways on his head.

“Dream? How is this working? Why does it feel like I’m not in a game?”

“That’s the best part!” Dream grinned. “The headset does something to paralyze your body, like when you’re sleeping, and influences your mind so that the game feels like the real world. At least, that’s what the advertisements said.”

George made an ‘o’ with his mouth and glanced around. In the top right corner of his field of vision was a clock, which read 2:05 pm in blinking green numbers.

Dream had messaged him earlier at around 2:00, which meant he’d only been unconscious for around a minute before waking up in the game. He’d probably taken around three or four minutes to put the headset on, get used to it, launch Among Us, and connect to Dream’s game.

A new voice brought him back to the world around him.

“Ooh, Skeppy, I’m so excited!”

George looked back at the seats against the wall and saw BadBoyHalo tugging on Skeppy’s sleeve as the latter struggled to free himself from the straps.

“I know Bad, you’ve said that like twelve times,” Skeppy lamented as he finally stood, but he was smiling.

Bad beamed right back, and George had to look away before he started grinning like an idiot at his two oblivious friends.

“You two are ridiculous. Just marry each other already,” Sapnap’s voice said from behind George. He turned to watch as Sapnap walked up to stand between him and Dream.

Bad’s face went pink as he shook his head vigorously, muttering something about muffinheads under his breath. Skeppy just winked at Sapnap, grinning.

Sapnap shrugged and turned to whack Dream on the back in greeting. Of course, that quickly turned into him and Dream chasing each other around the room, hitting each other harder every time.

George wandered up to the control computer, sitting in the center of the ship like always. As he got closer, it flared to life and displayed the same customization screen as the normal game would, except only the colors.

George tapped dark blue, jumping back in surprise as a suctioning noise erupted from the walls. Seconds later, a circular hole opened up in the ceiling, and a clear tube dropped to the floor with a loud _clang_.

Dream laughed, suddenly right behind George. Fleetingly, George wondered what had happened to Sapnap. “It scared me when I did it, too.”

George picked the plastic tube up and turned it in his hands until he found a latch. He flicked it up and pulled the accompanying section of plastic open, using the other hand to grab the dark blue bundle inside.

As soon as he pulled the suit free, another circular hole appeared, this one in the wall and closer to the floor.

Dream took the clear tube from George and closed it, shoving it into the opening and watching as it disappeared with another suctioning sound.

George pulled the suit on over his clothes, which in-game appeared as a plain black shirt and joggers.

As he settled the metal collar over his shoulders, a pedestal rose from the floor near the computer with a matching blue helmet.

George grabbed it, and Bad, Skeppy, and Sapnap—who had apparently been hidden from Dream behind one of the giant metal boxes littering the floor—wandered over to choose their suits.

Of course, Bad and Skeppy stuck with black and cyan. Sapnap chose red.

Shortly after they had finished, more voices joined the now-consistent background noise.

Karl, Quackity, Technoblade, Wilbur, and Fundy had logged on.

George talked with Dream and Sapnap while their newest friends chose suit colors.

Karl had purple, Wilbur had yellow, Quackity had white, Techno had pink, and Fundy had orange.

Dream quickly scanned everyone, grinned, and slammed a red button that was next to the customization computer.

All at once, the entire room trembled and shook, causing everyone to grab onto something to stay upright. After a moment, it stopped with a last lurch, and the doors opened with a hissing noise.

Beyond their threshold were the familiar tables of the cafeteria.

They had arrived in the Skeld.


	2. Round One

George’s view immediately lit up with flashing blue lettering: CREWMATE

Underneath, which he suspected was unique to the VR, were the words: MISSION: FIND THE IMPOSTOR

When the words faded, a little spinning, circular sensor appeared in the bottom right corner of George’s field of vision.

Confused, he stepped out into the cafeteria and turned towards Dream, who’d been standing behind him.

The sensor made a whirring noise and started spinning faster, and Dream was suddenly outlined in glowing blue.

DREAM, said the sensor, in the same robotic voice that George remembered from when he first entered the game.

_Huh, an identification sensor. I wonder if there’s a way for the impostor to disable them in the sabotage screen._

Meanwhile, Dream had noticed he was staring and turned towards him. His face was obscured by his helmet, but George could tell the moment his friend saw the outline by the way Dream reached out a hand as if to trace it.

“Pretty useful, right?” George teased, startling Dream out of his wondering stupor.

“Unless you’re the impostor,” Dream answered, but George could read in his tone the same thoughts George had just had.

“Come on,” Dream said after a moment. “The round has started.”

Looking around, George noticed that they were mostly alone. The others had either gone into a different room or were spread out across the cafeteria, admiring the realistic graphics.

George nodded to Dream and headed towards a highlighted wire box in the cafeteria wall, not too far away from where they were standing.

He didn’t care if Dream knew he was a crewmate. He even suspected Dream wouldn’t kill him until last if he were the impostor.

Sure enough, Dream followed him across the room and watched as George struggled to connect the colors he couldn’t see.

Just as Dream went to tell him which ones were which colors, George touched two differently colored wires together.

Instantly they sparked, and pain lanced through his gloved hands and up his arms. Apparently the suits weren’t rubber.

Startled, he stumbled backwards, dropping the wires and curling his arms close to his chest as though that would protect them.

The pain lingered for a moment, making his fingers twitch.

Dream was looking at him, and although this face wasn’t visible, George could practically feel the concern radiating off of his friend.

“Are you okay?” Dream asked, reaching forward as if to make sure for himself.

George nodded. “Yeah. But apparently they included physical feeling in the realistic aspects of the VR. The wires can actually shock you.”

Dream paused. “Okay, we’ll have to be careful.”

George nodded again and let his friend tell him which wires went together.

As he connected the last two, the electrical box’s glowing outline faded and vanished, and the robotic voice was back.

“Wires complete. Follow the guidance compass to your next tasks.”

George watched as a small, diamond-shaped compass appeared next to the identification sensor. As he experimentally turned in a circle, the compass spun to show him which direction he was facing. But instead of cardinal directions, each point was tipped by a blue arrow, fading when he faced away from the task location and brightening when he was looking towards one.

“Hey Dream, do you have a task to do anywhere near here? Once you finish the first one, you get a little compass to tell you where the others are.”

Dream hesitated and then answered with a teasing smile, “Wouldn’t you like to know, Georgie.”

George rolled his eyes, even though he knew his friend couldn’t see, and headed towards the lower cafeteria exit.

“Well it says I have one this way, probably in admin. You coming?”

His friend grinned and nodded, and they left together.

Neither one could hear the screams through the walls to their right.

———

“I have another wires next,” George told Dream, crossing the electrical room to reach the glowing box on the back wall.

Dream stood guard at the door. “I’ll stay here in case anyone comes.”

George nodded absently and started on the brightly colored wires, trying his hardest not to connect the wrong ones.

Suddenly an alarm blared through the entire ship, making George’s ears ring. He jumped, nearly tearing a wire out of the box before he let go of it, and jogged back towards Dream.

His friend was still at the door, now staring back into the relative darkness of the electrical room. As soon as he saw George coming, he pivoted to look out into the hallway.

“Come on, I think that’s the alarm for a reported body!” Dream shouted over the incessant noise, grabbing George by the wrist and tugging him along.

They ran for the cafeteria together, narrowly missing colliding with Technoblade as he sprinted through storage.

By the time they entered the cafeteria, only Wilbur was missing, but he skidded in seconds later.

“Sorry! One of the doors was closed.”

They all seated themselves around the middle table, and George noticed that Quackity was missing.

Before anyone could say anything, the alarm suddenly cut out, and a screen lowered from the ceiling to hover just above the tabletop.

On it was a news broadcast.

There was a click and a whirring noise, and the audio sparked to life.

“...players of the new VR Among Us game lying asleep in comas across the world. We’re not sure yet if a person is affected when their in-game character is killed, but because the players’ in-game wounds appear on their real bodies a few minutes later in response to events, there is strong evidence supporting this possibility.”

A collective gasp went around the table. No one’s faces were visible, but George could feel the sudden fear and uncertainty.

The tv retracted back into the ceiling, and the robotic voice sounded again.

“Please discuss amongst yourselves who you believe is the impostor. Once you have decided, use the screen in front of you to cast your vote. The airlock is located along the far wall of the cafeteria, and it will open when voting is finished. Any condemned players will automatically be put in the airlock to avoid any resistance.”

As soon as the voice finished speaking, little screens popped out of the table, one in front of each person. Quackity’s seat was noticeably empty. No screen appeared in front of it.

For a few long seconds, the table was silent.

Then it burst into noise.

“This is real?!”

“Are we actually killing our friends?”

“What are we supposed to do?”

“Are we ever gonna get out of here if we refuse to play?”

The last one came from Dream, who had at some point removed his helmet. The entire table heard it and fell quiet, staring nervously at each other.

“The advertisements for the VR headsets said that they simulated a full ‘immersive experience’ for the user. They also said that means the player is only released from the game once it is completed, unless someone in the outside world presses the emergency release button on the headset.”

That came from Bad, who took his helmet off as he spoke.

“And there’s no way those are working if the news broadcasts are saying people are in comas. They’d have tried already,” Wilbur added.

By now everyone was taking their helmets off. Every face was creased with worry, eyes troubled.

“What do we do?” Karl asked timidly. Sapnap rested a hand on his shoulder reassuringly.

“Did anyone see the killer?” he asked. Everyone shook their heads. “So we play the game. Skip the vote for now, and we’ll see if there’s another way out of this. They didn’t say it’s confirmed that people are dying,” he suggested.

“It can’t have been more than five minutes since we started the game, though. How did they find out so fast?” George asked.

“I’m guessing the people that tried it before we did are still stuck in their games. We probably went under right before they broadcasted it on live television,” Wilbur answered thoughtfully.

“Why would the game show us the news screens then?” Karl asked.

“Maybe the developers had a secret agenda of trapping players in the game. They must have designed the emergency release buttons not to work,” Skeppy reasoned. Next to him, Bad frowned.

“What about all the people in first-person shooter games, or racing games? Those deaths...would be gruesome, to say the least,” he added.

Silence reigned for a moment. Then Dream cut in, “Let’s just focus on our own game for now.”

Nods followed from around the table, and heads bowed as they all found the skip button on their screens.

“Voting over,” the robotic voice returned. “Vote skipped. Please return to your rooms until the next round begins.”

Air hissed as doors slid open in the back wall of the cafeteria, on either side of the doors to the ship’s cockpit room in which they had arrived.

A neon green sign lit up above each, labeled with their names. George couldn’t help but notice the only red lettering, spelling out Quackity’s name above the only closed door.

He sighed as he started towards his.

One by one, each of them disappeared inside their rooms, and the doors closed with the ominous _click_ of a lock behind them.

But as George neared his door, he saw Bad abruptly spin and vanish into Skeppy’s room, half a second before the shorter’s door closed behind him.

Bad’s door closed a second later, like the game knew he wasn’t coming back.

George paused on the threshold of his door, eyes passing unseeingly over the simple bed, three books, and lamp that it held. Another door inside must lead to a restroom.

Suddenly the room seemed dark, sad, and very, very lonely.

George took a shaky step backwards, hesitated a second longer, spun on his heel, and made for Dream’s door.

Of course, Dream’s door was already closed and locked. George was the last one left in the cafeteria.

But the game must have known something wasn’t going the way it was supposed to, because George’s door suddenly slid closed with a _whoosh_ of compressed air.

At almost the same time, there was a soft _click_ as Dream’s door unlocked. It opened slowly, and George slipped inside before he could have a second thought.

Dream glanced up, startled, as he entered.

The door slid closed behind him.

“...George?”

George stared at his friend, mind struggling to come up with something to say that would make sense.

_I was thinking we could come up with a strategy._

_I wanted to team up._

_I was hoping we could talk._

_I’m scared._

Dream stood and slowly crossed the room. He wordlessly took George by the arm and led him over to the bed, where they both took a seat.

George stared at his lap, suddenly unsure.

“George, I-“

Dream paused, exhaled, and folded his hands together nervously.

“...I think I know why you’re here,” he said finally.

George interlocked his fingers, digging his nails into the backs of his hands.

Dream reached over and pried them apart, tangling George’s fingers with his own instead.

Neither of them said anything, but suddenly there was hope.


	3. Round Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the support!? I didn’t think this would be popular so quickly.
> 
> You guys are awesome :)

The time between rounds turned out to be about two hours long.

There was no sunlight in space, and the rooms didn’t have any windows, but the clock in the corner of George’s field of vision now said 4:23 pm in steady, blinking numbers.

George wished he felt as steady as those endless blinks.

Blink.

Not after his friend’s innocent death, probably starting a series of murders. 

Blink.

Maybe he’d be one eventually.

Blink.

He kind of hoped not.

Blink.

But it would free him from the game, wouldn’t it?

Blink.

4:24 pm.

Blink.

Blink.

Blink...

George felt a touch on his arm. He looked at the clock.

4:31 pm.

Huh. When did that much time pass?

Dream’s face was in front of him. He looked concerned.

Had George done something to make him concerned?

George blinked.

Dream was standing now. George thought he was saying something, but he couldn’t hear it.

The world seemed so far away.

He glanced back at the clock.

Blink.

Blink.

Blink.

....”-eorge.”

“George.”

“George?”

George glanced up.

Dream had crouched in front of him. His brows were furrowed. He looked worried.

George’s gaze slid past his friend’s face. Hovering in the doorway—when had the door opened?—were Bad and Sapnap.

“Is he okay?” Bad’s voice asked. It sounded like it was coming from underwater.

George focused back on Dream, who was shaking his head slowly. His eyes hadn’t left George’s face.

“I don’t know. He hasn’t responded to anything yet.”

Dream’s voice was a lot louder than Bad’s had been. George wished it were quieter. He liked the silence from before.

Just him and the clock.

“You think he’s in shock?” Sapnap asked.

Dream shrugged. “Could be. We’ve all had nothing but time to think about everything. Maybe that’s not a good thing for everyone in a situation like this.”

George wanted to watch the clock again, let it lull him into a rhythm outside of the murderous reality he’d been forced into.

If he died, would he lose the clock? Would he know how long it had been? Would there be a sense of time dragging on? Or would he feel nothing?

Something touched his shoulder. George glanced down at it.

Dream was still in front of him, but Bad and Sapnap had left. Dream’s green eyes were searching.

“George? You with me?”

George tried to nod. He didn’t know if it worked. His head felt slow and muddled. He didn’t think he could talk if he tried, either.

Dream moved his hand to carefully pull George into a standing position. George locked his knees and remained standing, but his muscles refused to work when he tried to walk.

He stared at the floor. The clock blinked tauntingly at him in the corner.

“George, you’re scaring me...” Dream’s voice came from above him. His friend gently lowered them both to the floor, and suddenly George was leaning backwards into Dream’s chest.

“M’sry,” George mumbled. He tried making a fist with one hand. It only half-worked.

Dream grabbed his trembling fingers and squeezed. “Don’t be. You have nothing to be sorry for,” he said. George could feel the vibrations of his voice.

“Dn’t wanna...” George managed. He’d been trying to explain something about why he didn’t want to play the game, but he didn’t think it quite came out that way.

He wanted his brain to stop hiding and just let him face reality.

Apparently that wasn’t going to happen.

“Don’t want to what?” Dream asked, but he probably already knew the answer.

George tried anyway. “Play.”

“George, I don’t know if this is shock or dissociation or what, but I think your brain is trying to protect you,” Dream theorized, taking George’s other hand so that he was holding both.

George nodded and let his head fall backwards onto his friend’s shoulder.

“Hopefully you’ll be feeling a little better by the time the round actually starts, but I’m sure the others wouldn’t mind waiting if the game will let them,” Dream suggested.

George exhaled and closed his eyes. He didn’t want to see the clock anymore. He wanted the fog obscuring his brain to go away.

“We can just stay here,” Dream said quietly.

George turned his head so that his nose was buried in his friend’s neck. He was glad he had Dream.

He felt Dream relax behind him, and his friend—without letting go of George’s hands—wrapped his arms around him in a hug. It felt safe.

George let himself drift.

———

He didn’t think he fell asleep, but he certainly wasn’t aware of his surroundings.

When he came to, Dream was gently shaking his shoulders.

“George, the round is starting, and it turns out the game isn’t going to let us wait. We have to go.”

George blinked and shook his head, trying to form some kind of alertness.

At least his body was working now.

He shifted forward and stood, turning to watch Dream get up after him.

“Are you...okay?” Dream asked hesitantly.

George nodded. “I think so. But I never want to go through that again. It was strange.” He shuddered as if getting rid of a phantom feeling.

Dream searched his face one last time before turning towards the door.

“Come on, then. The game said it would kill someone else if we don’t all get to the cafeteria in five minutes.”

George raised his eyebrows.

“It’s been three,” Dream answered his unspoken question.

George nodded and followed his friend out into the open cafeteria, standing restlessly around the middle table.

Everyone except Wilbur and Techno were already there.

Both Bad and Sapnap gave him worried glances, but Dream gave them a look and they dropped their gazes.

Finally, as their time dropped to one minute left, and then forty five seconds, Wilbur and Techno joined them.

“Round Two: starting in five, four, three, two, one...round started,” the robotic voice intoned from somewhere in the ceiling.

Everyone scattered.

George noticed that Sapnap and Karl stuck together this time, heading into weapons.

Technoblade, Wilbur, and Fundy all left alone. George saw Wilbur turn into admin. Fundy went through into storage. Techno jogged into medbay.

Bad and Skeppy disappeared after Techno, heading straight down the hallway instead of turning into medbay.

Dream was watching George.

“George?”

“Yeah?”

“I wanted to tell you...I’m not the impostor,” Dream admitted. George was silent.

“Usually it’s fun teasing each other into thinking we’re the impostor, but now it’s real. I don’t want you thinking I might suddenly turn on you. Or that I could possibly murder any of our friends...”

George sighed. “Yeah...but I don’t envy whoever is the impostor. At least we’re only forced to kill our friends by vote. I couldn’t imagine doing it up close.”

Dream winced when he said the word “kill.” George dropped his gaze to the floor.

“Come on,” Dream said, breaking the heavy silence that had fallen over them. “I have two tasks in electrical, if the double arrow is anything to go by.” He pulled his helmet on.

George mimicked him and trailed his friend back to electrical—the last place they’d been before the first round ended, he realized.

Dream quickly got to work on his tasks at the back of the room while George looked on. If Dream was telling the truth and neither of them were the impostor, at least they’d be safe with each other as witnesses.

As Dream closed the metal door on the wire box, the lights above them flickered. George glanced up.

The lights went out.

The total darkness in VR was much worse than the surrounding darkness of the original game. George couldn’t even see his hand in front of his face.

“George!” Dream’s voice sounded from somewhere in the darkness.

“Dream, where are you?”

“By the door. Follow my voice.”

George held his hands out in front of him and stumbled forwards. Suddenly his view lit up with the outline of a human body.

The identification sensor! He could use it to locate and follow his friend.

“Here!” George called as the outline grew big enough to fill his vision.

Dream’s form wavered as he turned to the hallway.

“We have to fix the lights,” he said, the glowing outline moving away towards the wall panel that held the light switches.

George followed him, stopping when Dream’s outline grew still.

He heard the sound of Dream fumbling along the wall in the dark, and then a screeching noise as his friend opened the metal panel.

“Sounds like this thing needs some oil,” Dream tried to joke. George smiled.

He could see the glowing green switches now, and went to flick the first two. Dream flipped the rest, and as soon as they were all in the right position, the lights came back on.

George peered out into the hallway, kind of surprised no one else showed up to help with lights.

Then again, this was much more difficult to navigate than the normal game.

George glanced both ways, making sure no one was in the hallway, before stepping out. Dream was right behind him, his presence reassuring.

George waved him forwards. “I have shields.”

“That’s kind of a dangerous spot to be,” Dream warned nervously.

“Then we’ll just have to hope the impostor took their chance with the lights off,” George answered, already heading left down the hallway.

Dream followed him closely until they got to shields, where George tapped at the red shapes while Dream glanced around anxiously.

As soon as George finished, they headed up to oxygen so that Dream could complete a filter task.

George was leading, and he immediately stumbled backwards, suddenly dizzy.

Dream, who was luckily right behind him, caught him before he could fall.

“George?”

George regained his balance and turned around to bury his face in his friend’s shoulder. Dream’s arms automatically came up to embrace him.

George could tell the moment Dream saw the inside of the room from his gasp and momentary falter.

He squeezed George tighter against him.

George shut his eyes, trying to shove away the image that seemed to be seared into his brain.

Lying sprawled on the floor in oxygen was Wilbur, face exposed. His helmet was lying a few feet to his left, the faceplate speckled with dark spots. One of his hands reached desperately for the door, never to reach it.

Wilbur had clearly been stabbed straight through the head, and George wondered if the game’s original killing methods were somehow implemented into the VR version.

Wilbur was barely even recognizable anymore. His entire face was coated with blood, and his nose was completely gone. A mangled mess of skin and blood and bone made up the middle of his face. Only one eye was still intact, staring unseeingly at the wall next to the door.

Some of his top teeth were showing through his cheek.

George struggled not to throw up.

Dream slowly walked them both into the room, and George opened his eyes to see the report button light up next to his sensor and compass. He was glad he was still turned away from Wilbur.

Dream reached a hand out, presumably towards his own report button. A second later, the alarm went off.

Dream quickly returned his hand to its previous position wrapped around George’s shoulders, turning them towards the door.

George pulled away slightly so they could attempt something similar to a walk, but it didn’t seem like Dream really wanted to let go, either.

They settled for a slower pace in order to stay together.

They reached the cafeteria right before Technoblade ran in, the last one.

Everyone sat down around the table. Skeppy was on Bad’s lap. George and Dream were sharing a chair, half on top of each other. None of them took their helmets off.

Wilbur’s chair remained empty.

“Who found the body?” Fundy asked from across the table.

Dream lifted his head from where it rested on top of George’s. “We did, in oxygen.”

“Where was everyone?” Techno asked next.

“We came up from shields after doing tasks in electrical. We were the ones who turned the lights back on,” Dream said quickly.

“Were you together the whole time?” Karl asked.

Dream and George both nodded. George didn’t think he was imagining Dream hugging him tighter, as if to say _couldn’t handle it apart._

“I went to medbay first, then to reactor and security,” Techno added.

Skeppy nodded. “We saw him in reactor. Went to electrical after the lights were fixed.”

“We went to weapons and then back through the cafeteria to admin. Wilbur was there,” Sapnap said, gesturing to Karl.

“I went to storage. After doing gas can I went back towards where Techno said he was in reactor. I never saw him, but I saw Skeppy and Bad heading towards electrical not much later, so he could be telling the truth,” Fundy explained.

“Why didn’t you see him if Skeppy and Bad did? Did you really go to reactor?” Sapnap asked.

Fundy shook his head. “Why would I say I didn’t see him if I wasn’t there? Skeppy, you saw me, right?”

Skeppy nodded. “Yeah, he’s telling the truth, about reactor at least,” he confirmed.

“What about Techno? Did you see anything in security?” Bad asked.

“Nothing unusual,” Techno answered in his typical emotionless tone.

“You said Wilbur was in admin, right Sapnap?” Fundy asked. Sapnap nodded.

“Where did he go afterwards?”

“I didn’t follow him, but he turned towards cafeteria. He must have gone through weapons and down to oxygen,” Sapnap explained.

“Which means someone from storage or electrical could have come up and killed him while everyone else was on the other side of the ship,” Fundy accused.

“I don’t think this is a self report, though. Dream and George both looked terrified when they walked in here. The killer would have masked their emotions long before the alarm went off,” Karl guessed.

“You were in storage, Fundy, but you were seen afterwards in reactor,” Techno reasoned.

“How was there a kill in oxygen if everyone was on the other side of the ship?” Sapnap asked rhetorically.

“Someone is lying about reactor. Even if you all saw each other, it wasn’t at the same time. Someone left reactor, made the kill, and went back before they were seen anywhere else. Probably while we were in electrical fixing the lights,” Dream suggested.

Silence reigned.

“So who are we voting for?” George asked hesitantly.

“I don’t know. It could really be anyone,” Sapnap answered.

“We could skip again,” Techno suggested.

“And let the impostor keep killing more people?” Skeppy argued.

“But we’d be condemning another person to death if we voted,” Bad reasoned.

The group fell silent again.

“Let’s skip,” Karl decided. “That way we kill the least amount of people for as long as possible.”

Everyone nodded and murmured agreement, casting their votes on their screens.

A second later, the robotic voice was back.

“Voting over. Vote skipped. Please return to your rooms until the next round begins.”

George and Dream wordlessly returned to Dream’s room together.

The doors probably all locked in order to prevent any between-round killing, but they needed each other’s company.

George never wanted to see another one of his friends lying dead on the floor again, but he didn’t know if that was an option.

How much longer could this go on?


End file.
